Today, we have the exclusive look at a full fledged X58 system. The new chipset will be the foundation for Nehalem and Intel already indicated to us that the new platform will deliver a large boost in performance across all applications compared to currently available products.
Intel will launch the X58 chipset with the same ICH-10 family of southbridges currently used on its P45 platform. ICH-10 supplies up to four PCI Express x16 paths, of which two, are PCI Express 2.0 paths. Other possible combinations are: one x16 path, two x16 paths, four x8 paths, and one 16 path and two x8 paths. Because of QuickPath however, we're able to realize far better performance with wide bandwidth and very low latency. According to Intel, Nehalem will initially come with a 20-bit wide 25.6 GB/sec. QuickPath link, which gives a theoretical 2x performance increase in bandwidth over the 1600MHz FSB currently available on the X48 platform.
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